My Omphalos Challenge

[AV1611VET]

This is a good example of a Bible Literalist interpreting scripture. They do it all the time, while simultaneously claiming it is wrong to interpret scripture.

Excuse me? Then you answer it. What do you guys want from me, anyway? Do you want me to just say, "I don't know," if it's not documented? You ask me where the water went after the flood. Okay, here's your answer. I don't know, the Bible doesn't say. Is that what you're looking for? The Flood, second only to the Creation, is my minor forte, and when I get questions like, "How were all those animals fed?" I'm not going to shrug my shoulders and say, "I don't know."

As I have said before, we know enough of how God operated in other, similar circumstances, that we can intelligently speculate how He did things during the Flood. It's called Bible maturity, and it separates the men from the boys.

 

[dlamberth]

Excuse me? Then you answer it. What do you guys want from me, anyway?

Personally, I'm looking for things that are not made up, that's all.


.

 

[ReverendDG]

Yes.

seems to me you don't

Don't worry --- I know what it is.

uh huh, i really doubt it

Correct --- Omphalos is embedded history.

what does that even mean? you are just redefining words, please go look up what history means first and how everyone else uses it

True.

then how do you get the 6000 year old figure? oh you go to another story, while you whine about people arguing from the same part of the bible

I'm not stating a problem - I'm stating a challenge.

thats not a challenge, its you trying to claim that age is not the same as something being old, while trying to weasel out of being labeled a believer in last thursdayism

No, it doesn't. Before you accuse God of being a liar, you need to subject age to the Law of Non-contradiction and see if it passes. If it does (which it does), then no contradiction has occurred. In the case of the earth, it is [physically] 4.57 billion years old and [existentially] 6100 years old. Had age not passed the Law of Non-contradiction, the earth would "be" [physically] 4.57 billion years old and [physically] 6100 years old. For a better understanding of this, q.v. here.

you see this is your problem, you keep trying to redefine words, how old something is, is also how long it has existed,
i mean if you say something like "i'm 28 years old, but my substance is over 14.5 billion years old" this would be correct, because we are all made of carbon formed from stars.
but you are saying the earth is both young and old at the same time, you just use weasel words to make it seem like its not a contradiction

the fact is, if you need to shift how words are used to make your argument its probably wrong

He didn't. Take Adam for example. God made Adam [arbitrarily] 30 years old. He didn't make Adam to just seem 30 years old, He made Adam to be 30 years old.

if an outside person say adam, would they know the difference? if not then theres no difference, most logical people would think hes 30.

but this isn't all the question and you know it, the deception would come if we see old scars that he got when he was 8. an appendix scar that he got removed and we think he had all this stuff happen when he didn't

then god tells us hes only a day old, even though everything points to him living 30 years.
that my friend is deception, the concept is that you say something to lead someone to believe something, when the truth is something else

No, it doesn't. A deceitful God wouldn't detail what He did, when He did it, how He did it, where He did it, why He did it, and who the eyewitnesses were. And again, there's no law [of non-contradiction] being broken, so there's no reason to resort to an accusation of deceit.

you don't even understand the law of non-contradiction enough to even argue it
its not even about the law, its about the fact that you mutilate the english language to make up poor theology
yeah and the creation, the evidence, shows the bible is wrong, 100% factually wrong
as its been said, its irrelevant if we find a note detailing a murder, say i shot so and so with a 9mm in the head. but we find the person dead by hanging himself
is the note right? only an idiot would believe its right over what the eyes can see

I actually agree with this [sans hypocrisy]. It takes the whole Bible, plus another 2000 years of secular documentation to arrive at 6100 years.

you are a hypocrite, you do whine about people bringing up stuff outside genesis 1, then you go and do it yourself
theres no way you could come up with 6100 years just using genesis 1.

Indeed.

don't complain then

 

[FishFace]

It doesn't take a Rhodes Scholar, Domenico to ascertain this.

1. According to the Bible, the earth has been in existence only 6100 years and, in fact, predates the sun, moon, and stars.
2. According to science, the earth is 4.57 billion years old.

Can statements 1 and 2 be reconciled?

Yes. Number 1 is false.

Some see these two statements and just assume they're contradictory;

No, not assume, AV, they just are. There is no difference in meaning between the following two statements:

The earth is 4.5 billion years old;
The earth has existed for 4.5 billion years.

Got it, yet? It would be nice if you would at least acknowledge or deny these rather simple things.

 

[FishFace]

Excuse me? Then you answer it. What do you guys want from me, anyway? Do you want me to just say, "I don't know," if it's not documented? You ask me where the water went after the flood.

Really we tend to ask you, "do you have any good reason to believe the flood actually happen to which you generally make no response.

 

[thaumaturgy]

The Flood, second only to the Creation, is my minor forte, and when I get questions like, "How were all those animals fed?" I'm not going to shrug my shoulders and say, "I don't know."

I'm seeing a trend here:

Forte #1: Creation

AV, when faced with the science that is contradictory to the Biblical literal reading comes up with "Maturity without history". A 4.5billion year old earth that has been in existence only about 6100 years.

Forte #2: The Flood

AV, when face with the scientific facts that the geologic record seems to preclude a global flood a la the literal biblical reading, comes up with "God cleaned it up!"

AV, you can just limit yourself to one really big forte:

The Art of the Unfalsifiable!

As I have said before, we know enough of how God operated in other, similar circumstances

Other, similar circumstances????

Like that other time he created the earth? Or that other Flood that wiped out all life except a select group on an ark?

Or are you refering to the doublets in the creation and the Noachian Flood accounts as 2 examples of each type of event?

, that we can intelligently speculate how He did things during the Flood.

That's a bit of hubris on your part when you are talking about a being who can make something simultaneously 4.5billion years old and only have been around for 6100.

I don't think we can speak intelligibly about something that can do THAT!

It's called Bible maturity, and it separates the men from the boys.

Bible maturity without history? Or Bible maturity without logic?

 

[Nathan Poe]

Excuse me? Then you answer it. What do you guys want from me, anyway? Do you want me to just say, "I don't know," if it's not documented? You ask me where the water went after the flood. Okay, here's your answer. I don't know, the Bible doesn't say. Is that what you're looking for? The Flood, second only to the Creation, is my minor forte, and when I get questions like, "How were all those animals fed?" I'm not going to shrug my shoulders and say, "I don't know."

Too bad -- "I don't know" is an honest answer, at least.

As I have said before, we know enough of how God operated in other, similar circumstances, that we can intelligently speculate how He did things during the Flood.

Perhaps you should begin, then.

It's called Bible maturity, and it separates the men from the boys.

So find a man to answer the question.

 

[Patashu]

AV1611VET: It's OK to say 'I don't know' if you actually don't know.

 

[TheBear]

http://christianforums.com/t6793820-the-big-kahuna.html

 

[MattTheAgnostic]

Show me how the Omphalos Hypothesis is deceptive without disrespecting a literal interpretation of Genesis 1.

• The intent of this thread is to show that one would have to deny a literal interpretation of Genesis 1 in order to claim Omphalism.

Because starlight is not required for the world to be functional.

 

[Split Rock]

Excuse me? Then you answer it. What do you guys want from me, anyway? Do you want me to just say, "I don't know," if it's not documented? You ask me where the water went after the flood. Okay, here's your answer. I don't know, the Bible doesn't say. Is that what you're looking for? The Flood, second only to the Creation, is my minor forte, and when I get questions like, "How were all those animals fed?" I'm not going to shrug my shoulders and say, "I don't know."

I won't speak for the others, but I will tell you what I expect from you AVET... *Consistency*.

If it is wrong from others to interpret scripture according to their understanding of God and the Bible, then it is wrong for you to do the same.

If it is OK for you to interpret scripture according to your understanding of God and the Bible, then it is OK for others to do the same.

I realize you don't like to acknowledge this, because then you loose the aura of Divine Inerrancy that you use like a sledge hammer. The fact of the matter is that God didn't write the Bible and you aren't God.

As I have said before, we know enough of how God operated in other, similar circumstances, that we can intelligently speculate how He did things during the Flood. It's called Bible maturity, and it separates the men from the boys.

As I mentioned to dad, ad hoc explanations are what separate the men from the boys. Children use them all the time... adults don't.

 

[Lakercom]

The flood of Noah does present an interesting study as to how God accomplished it, and He did. The flood was worldwide and to a significant depth of water that covered all the land. I listened to Dr. Larry Vardiman give a lecture at our local university in November about the ice age (and flood). I have also read excerpts from the book by Oard on the same and there are others books by Henry Morris and others that cover the deluge (flood).

Here is my layman’s explanation how God could have done it:

The earth had nowhere near the height of landmass that we have today. The continents were probably more clustered, perhaps even into a single mass. What AV says about the problem of too much water to do the job (i.e. eliminate after the flood) is true if you assume the mountains were to their current height then. If all the water in the world today was in the form of liquid in the sea, it will only allow a depth of a few hundred feet higher than current sea level. Unless God used supernatural means to “temporarily create” water there would not be enough water to cover the earth. There was some ground water available but not near enough. There surely were only small hills and no “mountains”, at least to the height of what we call mountains here in British Columbia. However, currently the amount (volume) of water in the sea far surpasses the volume of landmass above sea level so there is/was lots of water to do the job.

As to how the animals were fed on the ark that is also a puzzle, but solvable. There were approximately 15,000 air breathing species on the ark. The ark is large enough that approximately half the ark would be required to house the animals. This is not impossible. The average dinosaur was only the size of a sheep and if immature ones were used they would be even smaller. Whether the other half could be enough room to store the food I am not sure. I work at a cattle ranch (note: that is where I should be right now according to my wife (I work for my parents so I have not been fired =-]} and looking at the amount of hay we have stored for the winter (we feed 200 days a year) it should be possible to house the cows in that size of barns with multiple floors, which the ark had. As to drinking water that I am not sure of. A cow’s digestive system requires lots of water, 5–10 gallons a day. Anyway, it might be possible even without supernatural intervention. God could simply have supernaturally suspended their need for food and water and/or put them into a hibernation. It took a supernatural procedure to gather all the animals to the ark so He could have taken other divine measures as well.

As to how the waters abated quick enough after the flood, evaporation would not be sufficient to do the job but the uplifting of land mass would. I listened to creation scientist (Emil Sylvestru) at a local church recently who said the model for continental “drift” works best at a speed of four metres per minute or something like that so the uplifting of the land could have also occurred at a significant rate to accomplish this.

The ice age following the flood can be shown using a climate model with atmospheric dust (from volcanoes and/or wind erosion caused by high winds without plant cover) and warm oceans. The ice age would have lasted approximately 1,000 years. A climate model of (only) a cold earth without warm oceans cannot produce enough precipitation to amass enough ice to the depths required. The oldest book in the bible is the book of Job and it is the only book that makes significant mention of ice so this fits with the time of the ice age being after the flood, 4300 years ago.

This long post probably does not fit the pattern of a debating type discussion group but I prefer to submit occasional, longer posts. Please advise any mistakes I have made with the numbers. I did not look back on the various articles, books, and speakers I have used on the subject, as time does not allow it.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

The earth had nowhere near the height of landmass that we have today. The continents were probably more clustered, perhaps even into a single mass. What AV says about the problem of too much water to do the job (i.e. eliminate after the flood) is true if you assume the mountains were to their current height then. If all the water in the world today was in the form of liquid in the sea, it will only allow a depth of a few hundred feet higher than current sea level.

This is plausable if one suspends the traditional timeline of Creationist cosmology; namely, that the Flood occured ~4000 years ago.

Unless God used supernatural means to “temporarily create” water there would not be enough water to cover the earth.

And why do you think he didn't do this?

As to how the animals were fed on the ark that is also a puzzle, but solvable. There were approximately 15,000 air breathing species on the ark. The ark is large enough that approximately half the ark would be required to house the animals. This is not impossible.

On the contrary:
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CH/CH512.html

The average dinosaur was only the size of a sheep

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CH/CH512_2.html

and if immature ones were used they would be even smaller.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CH/CH512_1.html

Whether the other half could be enough room to store the food I am not sure. I work at a cattle ranch and looking at the amount of hay we have stored for the winter (we feed 200 days a year) it should be possible to house the cows in that size of barns with multiple floors, which the ark had.

Except we're not talking about cows and hay. We're talking about all species with all their dietary requirements.

As to drinking water that I am not sure of. A cow’s digestive system requires lots of water, 5–10 gallons a day. Anyway, it might be possible even without supernatural intervention. God could simply have supernaturally suspended their need for food and water and/or put them into a hibernation.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CH/CH513.html

It took a supernatural procedure to gather all the animals to the ark so He could have taken other divine measures as well.

If you're going to appeal to divine intervention, why come up with this scenario anyway?

As to how the waters abated quick enough after the flood, evaporation would not be sufficient to do the job but the uplifting of land mass would. I listened to creation scientist (Emil Sylvestru) at a local church recently who said the model for continental “drift” works best at a speed of four metres per minute or something like that so the uplifting of the land could have also occurred at a significant rate to accomplish this.

Except continental drift doesn't involve the uplifting land.

The ice age following the flood can be shown using a climate model with atmospheric dust (from volcanoes and/or wind erosion caused by high winds without plant cover) and warm oceans. The ice age would have lasted approximately 1,000 years. A climate model of (only) a cold earth without warm oceans cannot produce enough precipitation to amass enough ice to the depths required. The oldest book in the bible is the book of Job and it is the only book that makes significant mention of ice so this fits with the time of the ice age being after the flood, 4300 years ago.

Which contradicts your above statements regarding the height of the pre-Flood world (namely, the timelines that must be assumed).

 

[Lakercom]

God usually works miracles through natural processes. When He performs a miracle it is produced by natural means or, more accurately, temporarily suspends the natural laws of the universe but the results are evident in the natural world otherwise we would not see them happening.

Wiccan_Child, your questions and contrary evidence is not worth my time going through one by one. Questioning the timelines and sizes of animals are somewhat petty in your comment and since the evidence requires interpretation, one scientist can dispute this with another scientist. I just know what my sources (scientists) have told me.. The whole point of my speculating as to how God did the flood of Noah is we don't know all the facts and, it has to be evident to you, considering you are seriously asking me the details as to the "evidence", that, it was supernatural. God could have done a "beam me up, Scotty" to eliminate all the evil people in the world (which he might do soon, btw, however I expect the direction may not be up) and/or He could have all the animals bring their own "lunch kits" (containers?) with freeze dried food, for that matter. He is God and He uses the same creative power to do miracles today as when he created the universe in six literal days.

To answer a couple of your questions, my remark about comparing “continental drift” and the huge elevation changes was not clear but my intention was that the amount of change in the earth’s crust was huge and the uplifting of the earth was caused by volcanic, compressive and metamorphic processes as well as sedimentary deposition. There was a 40,000 miles of zones where the plates collided creating huge masses of volcanic activity (magma). So my remark was partly correct in that the colliding plates caused some of the elevation change. As to all your references to timelines, I am not clear what you are saying. The flood occurred around/about 4400 BC so what are you talking about? The ice age would have followed shortly thereafter as a result of the changed weather from volcanic activity and the flood itself. Defoliated landmasses cannot absorb near as much heat as forests or fields and the volcanic activity, which likely continued for some time after the yearlong flood, caused the worlds oceans to be very warm. The result is huge amounts of precipitation and cool continents. The mountains would been uplifted by the time of the ice age and the location of the deepest ice confirms the theory i.e. the depth of the ice sheet was much deeper in the inland continental areas of the Canadian Shield than say, where I live in British Columbia, which has a higher elevation.

 

[flameingcrouton]

Show me how the Omphalos Hypothesis is deceptive without disrespecting a literal interpretation of Genesis 1.

• The intent of this thread is to show that one would have to deny a literal interpretation of Genesis 1 in order to claim Omphalism.

Generally, it helps to define the term your that your thread revolves around when you start one. I'm so tired of people posting threads with topics like Omphalos Hypothesis, or Nibiru and just assume people know what they're talking about. If you take the time to create a thread, define your terms, and actually show the verse instead of just saying gen 1:13

 

[Lakercom]

Generally, it helps to define the term your that your thread revolves around when you start one. I'm so tired of people posting threads with topics like Omphalos Hypothesis, or Nibiru and just assume people know what they're talking about. If you take the time to create a thread, define your terms, and actually show the verse instead of just saying gen 1:13

I agree, I am still not sure what the topic is and i have even looked up omphalos in the dictionary.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

God usually works miracles through natural processes. When He performs a miracle it is produced by natural means or, more accurately, temporarily suspends the natural laws of the universe but the results are evident in the natural world otherwise we would not see them happening.

Which kinda flies in the face of 'natural processes'. How can something be considered a natural process if it requires the suspension of natural laws?

Wiccan_Child, your questions and contrary evidence is not worth my time going through one by one. Questioning the timelines and sizes of animals are somewhat petty in your comment and since the evidence requires interpretation, one scientist can dispute this with another scientist.

Nevertheless, you made claims that I demonstrated to be false. It is not a question of interpretation; the notion of a global flood as Genesis has long been refuted.

I just know what my sources (scientists) have told me.. The whole point of my speculating as to how God did the flood of Noah is we don't know all the facts and, it has to be evident to you, considering you are seriously asking me the details as to the "evidence", that, it was supernatural.

So why bother with naturalistic explanations?

God could have done a "beam me up, Scotty" to eliminate all the evil people in the world (which he might do soon, btw, however I expect the direction may not be up)

FYI: Christians have been saying it's 'soon' for 2000 years. I wouldn't hold my breath.

and/or He could have all the animals bring their own "lunch kits" (containers?) with freeze dried food, for that matter. He is God and He uses the same creative power to do miracles today as when he created the universe in six literal days.

Which is why I puzzled over your motivation for this. Why postulate these 'natural' explanations when you're perfectly happy with the 'goddidit' one?

To answer a couple of your questions, my remark about comparing “continental drift” and the huge elevation changes was not clear but my intention was that the amount of change in the earth’s crust was huge and the uplifting of the earth was caused by volcanic, compressive and metamorphic processes as well as sedimentary deposition. There was a 40,000 miles of zones where the plates collided creating huge masses of volcanic activity (magma). So my remark was partly correct in that the colliding plates caused some of the elevation change.

Yes, but not to the extremes you're talking of. Getting Everest from a hill in a matter of months or years by continental drift just wouldn't happen. Indeed, we would see it happen today if it did.

As to all your references to timelines, I am not clear what you are saying. The flood occurred around/about 4400 BC so what are you talking about?

You said:

"The continents were probably more clustered, perhaps even into a single mass."

"If all the water in the world today was in the form of liquid in the sea, it will only allow a depth of a few hundred feet higher than current sea level."

This is somewhat plausable if one does not conform to the standard "the flood happened 4000 years ago" timeline, since the geographical changes involved simply couldn't happen (or, at least, would leave a markedly different Earth than the one we have today).

The ice age would have followed shortly thereafter as a result of the changed weather from volcanic activity and the flood itself.

Except there's no evidence of an ice-age 4000 years ago. The last significant ice age (including mini-ice-ages) was ~10-20 thousand years ago.

Defoliated landmasses cannot absorb near as much heat as forests or fields and the volcanic activity, which likely continued for some time after the yearlong flood, caused the worlds oceans to be very warm.

Question: what happened to all the plants? You say the landmasses were defoliated, but the Earth today has acres of flora. Indeed, trees have been dated to be older than 4000 years old (the supposed time of the flood), so what gives?

The result is huge amounts of precipitation and cool continents. The mountains would been uplifted by the time of the ice age and the location of the deepest ice confirms the theory i.e. the depth of the ice sheet was much deeper in the inland continental areas of the Canadian Shield than say, where I live in British Columbia, which has a higher elevation.

On the contrary:

" The earth under the ice sheets is isostatically adjusted to the mass of ice. Even if 10,000 or more feet of ice were dropped on Greenland and Antarctica in only a few years about 4,000 years ago, it would take over 12,000 years to reach the observed (today) degree of adjustment. Scandinavia and Canada are still rebounding from the disappearance of glaciers covering them at the end of the last ice age (Strahler 1987, chap. 27). It would have taken thousands of additional years for the weight of the ice to push them down in the first place."

Ref: Strahler, Arthur N., 1987. Science and Earth History: The Evolution/Creation Controversy, Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, chpt. 26-28.

From: http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CH/CH590.html

 

[Lakercom]

Which kinda flies in the face of 'natural processes'. How can something be considered a natural process if it requires the suspension of natural laws?

Reply by Lakercom:
God exists outside of the dinmensions of this earth and is all powerful so He can suspend the natural laws and/or control them however He wants.

 

[Lakercom]

Sorry for the confusing post I just made. I am new to this multi quote debating post procedure. Please do try to make sense of it by imagining every second paragraphs or so being mine

 

[Baggins]

Sorry, you cannot interpret everything by Uniformitarianism i.e. interpret everything you can see by the rate of current processes and changes.

Sorry, but unless all you want to do is make up fairy tales like you're doing, you can only use uniformitarian assumptions to make hypothesise about the past.

Saying that 4000 years ago plate tectonics worked at much faster rates is just ignoring the evidence of what super fast plate tectonics would do to the earth; turn it into a molten ball.

As Wiccan Child says - what is the point of saying you are going to suggest a naturalistic explanation for a Noachian flood and the saying " and here god suspended the natural laws of the universe......and here.......and here........and here"

I have a lot more time for people like AV who just ignore the logical iconsistencies of their story with reality than with people who will mangle science in a shoddy attempt to explain them. By all means go with the story if you must but perverting science to try and support that stance is counter productive because it is so easy to show you are wrong.

We have ice cores showing annual snowfall that go back thousands of years uninterrupted by any flood, we have trees that older than this suposed flood, we have no geological evidence of this flood. We have civilisations that flourished perfectly happily when this flood was supposed to have occured. We have nautical engineers who will tell you that building a wooden ship the size of the ark is impossible, even with todays technology. There is not one part of the story that can withstand scrutiny.

Safe to assume that it never happened and the story in the bible is supposed to make a point about god's relationship with his creation.

And just saying you have a different interpretation of the evidence is just lame, I have 2 degrees in geoscience and 20 years experience in applied geology and geophysics, you, I think it is safe to assume, don't. You have spent a few days trawling creationist web sites and have decided to believe what they have fed you uncritically.